A spinoff of the foot-impalingly popularFinal Fantasy franchise, and the first Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles game for the DS. Unlike the first game, its main mode of play is a story-mode with lots of dialog and pre-made characters. The story follows a pair of Clavat twins named Yuri and Chelinka, whose hometown is attacked and Chelinka falls into a coma. When she awakens, she has lost the ability to speak. Together, they set out on a journey to help Chelinka regain her voice, find their childhood teachers Alhanalem and Meeth, discover why their home was attacked, and learn the purpose of a unique crystal they own. All while trying to stop an ancient prophecy from destroying the world.

There is also a multiplayer mode, which is more like the first game. You create your own character, selecting name, race, and gender, and set off on fetch quests through dungeons you've cleared in solo mode. Also like the first game, you can do this on your own or with nearby friends over the DS's local wireless.

And I Must Scream: "My power can undo this! Over and again!" You almost have to pity him when you hear him think Help me...

Artificial Stupidity: Your partners AI is phenomally stupid, making them much more of a liability than anything else. They rarely move, don't attack often and if an enemy is lining up an attack at them, most of the time they will not get out of the way. Their self preservation is atrocious, as they will not get out of the way, even if their HP is critical. A particularly egregious example is their ineptitude in platforming, as they cannot time jumps and will often kill themselves trying to get to you if you're on a far away platform. You will waste a lot of raise magicite on them in the later boss battles, which can get rather infuriating.

Bad Moon Rising - It's even the tagline on the back of the box! It's hard for a blood-red moon to be anything but ominous...

Combination Attack: Basic magic spells can be stacked on top of one another for added effect (two Fire spells make a Fira {or Firaga with proper timing} attack, and spells of different elements can be combined to create a Gravity spell). The basic elements can also be combined with a Charged Attack for an elemental strike.

Continuity Nod: The appearance of Lich is a nod to her role in the first game.

Two of the moogles from the first game, Stiltzkin (who gave the tutorial) and Artimecion (from the Striped Brigands) make appearances.

Cosmic Retcon: The game ends with the Yuris and Chelinkas from every reality to prevent the tragic events of the game, bringing back their parents to grow up as a normal family.

Corrupt Church: The Crystal Temple. Gets progressively more oppressive as the game goes on. Plus its temple is the final dungeon, and its Pope is using it to recreate the world in his own image.

Dungeon Bypass: Only scripted obstacles and doors with keys, of which are few, are unpassable.Most of the room puzzle's purpose is to materialize or move platforms to reach points that are just out of reach.Not only can your chatacters jump on each other, but you can stack any item to make a ladder.And most of the items you find are cheap rubbish you can buy for less than 5 gil at the shops.Do the math.

Selkies take this trope Up to Eleven:while they cannot double-jump or use ziplines when holding a key, they can just throw the key against a wall, make it bounce on their head, and run on the zipline as if it was a tightrope while balancing the key on their head.Someone sign them up for circus already.

"End of the World" Special: Starsingers are a somewhat limited form of this. Yuri and Chelinka fulfill the trope more literally in the end.

Gainax Ending: The ending sequence. Chelinka's Heroic Sacrifice to heal Yuri of his mysterious illness causes Yuri to become Unstuck in Time, and after wandering around for a little bit, the collective Yuris and Chelinkas of all the parallel universes Cosmic Retcon the events of the game from ever occuring, because Magic in this continuity works based on alternate universes.

MacGuffin Girl: Chelinka is pursued by the Temple for her crystal abilities. Yuri might be of value to them too, but Chelinka is the only one who can make the crystal shine on her own. Tilika and Lady Aleria were also this, with tragic results.

Magikarp Power: Unlike most games in the series, Lilties begin this one as a support class, with slow attacks and only moderate power. It's arguable where the exact turning point is, but if leveled up fully, well, it quickly becomes apparent why they ruled the world.

Nerf: In the first game, all classes could easily be played as close range fighters, with Lilties being the most brutal. In Ring of Fates, while Yukes can still be played as melee characters, Selkies are now archers and Lilties are largely a support class (though with enough leveling, that changes).

Young Yuri (on being allowed to explore The City alone): We are practically adulterous.

Latov: Erm, not quite.

A few minutes later, Yuri accuses a merchant of being a clair-voyeur.

Patchwork Map: One level where you'll have to chose between running over lava that burns you or ice that freezes you in a slightly lengthened period of time. You need not worry about doing large amounts of backtracking if you decided you don't like the path you chose. The ice path is side by side with the lava.

Super Drowning Skills: Running through shallow water is okay. Anything above the head is fatal. Latov really should have given Yuri some swimming lessons....

Time-Compression Montage: The game moves forward several years in a single cutscene. The twins' age is still ambiguous, but they go from five-ish to somewhere between eight and ten.

You get it again after the final boss fight when Yuri is dying.

Timed Mission: Multiplayer mode allows you to take on side missions for more experience and money. All of these have time limits and span multiple levels. The goal is to finish each one as quickly as possible.

Verbal Tic: Alhanalem the Yuke has a habit of ending every sentence with words ending in emphasizing the "al" (written in text a la "physicAL), and his Lilty partner Meeth ends a lot of hers with "e" sounds. Alhanalem and Meeth end their sentences with "de aru" and "desu", respectively, in the Japanese version.

What the Hell, Dad?: Latov loves his children, but one has to question his judgment in allowing them to play with hatchets, spelunk in the monster-filled cave on their property, and walk around the city alone.

Wild Child: Gnash, who has been living alone in the woods since a sickness struck his hometown.

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